


In the Woods Somewhere

by CyborgShepard



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alchemy, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Witchcraft, Everyone Has a Crush on Ana, F/F, Monster!Moira, Size Difference
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-07
Updated: 2018-07-07
Packaged: 2019-06-01 19:26:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15150188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CyborgShepard/pseuds/CyborgShepard
Summary: Ana called her a witch.





	In the Woods Somewhere

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by [ these](http://about92bleachedrainbows.tumblr.com/post/174881903700/kinda-took-my-old-sketch-of-faerie-moira-and) [artworks](http://about92bleachedrainbows.tumblr.com/post/175459339830/angela-in-b4-3) by [BleachedRainbows](http://about92bleachedrainbows.tumblr.com/)!!! Go check out her art!!! <3

Ana called her a witch.

Though of course, Angela knew that such beings did not exist. They could not. Certain herbs could alleviate fatigue and agony, salt could purify. Leaves could be crushed to create salve for burns, and doctors could perform miracles with little but their needles and rubbing alcohol, but that didn’t mean the apocatheries and the surgeons were witches. That wasn’t witchcraft; wasn’t _necromancy._

But Ana also called her demon, and Angela believed in demons.

Beneath her riding boots twigs cracked and crumbled and around her creatures skittered, chirping to each other in the thick foliage overhead. A cacophony of noises but Angela’s head was fuzzy, as though cotton had been stuffed into her ears, and she could hardly hear it all. In her shaking fist her lantern was gripped like her saving grace, and it threw orange light about her, making the black trees glow and illuminating a thousand tiny eyes, all watching her.

Two pairs stood out, red and blue. She knew two creatures were following her, flanking her through the underbrush, but she didn’t dare look at them.  She didn’t dare stop, too afraid that her legs would freeze up and she’d be stuck in the thickest part of the forest, where the dawn never brushed its fingers. Around her the tree trunks were bigger than any building she’d ever seen, and she couldn’t remember ever feeling so small, so insignificant.

Angela swallowed against the anxiety constricting her throat. In her hand, in the inner pocket of her cloak, she made a fist, and in it was the gem, no bigger than half the size of her palm. If she had this, she would be safe. She had a _use._

A wicked part of her pointed out that the all-mighty forest witch could always eat her heart _after_ she gave her the stone and made the deal for Ana's life, but Angela shushed it, and pressed on along the worn, fern-fenced path.

Here in the darkness time didn’t pass, and all Angela had to gauge her distance was the soreness in her thighs and the wick of her lantern. The kerosene was burning low. If she didn’t hurry it wouldn’t be long before the only light would be snuffed and she’d truly be lost, forgotten to the dirt. The thought spurred her, and in her haste Angela didn’t take note of the fat, twisted root curling out of the forest floor til the toe of her boot tangled with it and she went skittering forward.

She threw out her right hand from her pocket. Her lantern clattered by her side, and when it fizzled and hissed and drowned in the kerosene she swore, frantically grappling for the handle and patting herself for her matchbox. It was pointless, though, and a fear so great surged up in her so suddenly Angela felt like she would cry, like she was a child once again: powerless and alone and terrified.

Though she wasn’t alone, was she? The eyes following her stopped when she stopped, and sniffed at the air, smelt her fear. Angela still had the gem in her hand, and she gripped it so tight the edges almost cut into the soft of her palm. She held the lantern to her as well, and reasoned the oil was still hot enough to blind if she threw it the right way.

Angela’s heart fluttered like a bird in a trap and she stared into the murky, rustling thicket, and tried not to suck down and choke on her breaths.

First came paws, stepping from the brush with trepidation. Then a peat-black and twitching snout, which lead to two little red eyes, watching her from behind needle-like whiskers. Angela could only see them because the creature’s eyes seemed glow in the dark, and she tried not to let that bother her too much. 

The fox crawled from the underbrush and padded around her, and then there were two, circling and sniffing in tandem. Angela winced. She ducked her head and pulled her knees tightly to her chest and wished she could be anywhere other than lost here on the floor of the forest, feeling more like prey than she ever had in her entire life. 

This had been a mistake. The townsfolk had warned her not to come, but she’d pushed on, convinced Ana's word could keep her safe. Convinced that this-- this _trinket_ might shield her.

Angela glared down at her hand, but the gem was lost to the dark. It must have caught some light, though, because the foxes whimpered and ducked from her, and their paws stamped the dirt, as though Angela was held the leash that kept them from running.

It was strange. Angela watched as they hissed and cried, and when the blue-eyed fox loosed a shrill and piercing scream Angela pushed herself to her boots and pulled her cloak around her. It bolted down the path, and where the moonlight broke through the canopy its fur shone, silver and red and black and suddenly-- gone, like a wisp of smoke left in the wake of a bullet.

The other circled her legs, keeping its belly so low to the ground it almost dragged against it. She looked at the gem in her hand, thumbed its diamond shape, stared out at the thin path.

Well, she’d come this far, hadn’t she?

She pocketed the crystal, and left the simpering lantern.

The red-eyed fox kept her company and didn’t stray far from her heel, though the faster she walked the faster it ran, til Angela was hurrying through the forest, the ice in the air burning her lungs and stinging her cheeks pink. Her cape whipped around her, and she was thankful her hair was tied back, else it cover her eyes and leave her truly blind to the midnight.

She didn’t have far to go. 

It led her to a lightened part of the woods where the trees split far enough apart that the moon could brush fingers of dull light against the floor, and when Angela shut her eyes she could hear a river, twinkling somewhere to the west. There was a clearing, wider than Angela’s garden back at home, and stones marked points along the perimeter. Like a compass, Angela realised, and in the centre was a flat slab inscribed with wards Angela couldn't read, black as charcoal and big enough for a body, or two.

She swallowed, and looked down at the fox by her leg, though it didn’t seem to notice her fear. That, or it was unperturbed by it.

It didn’t lead her to the slab -- and Angela breathed a sigh of relief as they passed it -- but instead to the side of the clearing itself, which was at the crest of a small knoll. The pathway didn’t track here, and while the fox darted down the side of the hill as though it were avian, using its momentum to bounce off rocks and stones and roots, Angela braced herself against the dirt and prayed her boots wouldn’t slip and send her tumbling. The fox was waiting for her at the bottom, and Angela could hear the river stronger, could smell smoke.

She kept her eyes ahead and her wits about her, followed the fox. 

Its twin was up the way and dancing in place, anxiously waiting for them to arrive. It stood by what looked like a gate holding a lit sconce, and when Angela peered further she could see a cottage, built in the middle of a small croft. Smoke chuffed from the chimney. The windows were warm and orange. It was strange, because the townsfolk had said the witch lived in--

One of the foxes screamed. Angela couldn’t tell which. But it was harsh and jarring and on instinct Angela through her hands to her ears, and she watched as her companion bolted towards the house, flying through the rungs on the fence. And Angela watched, because she couldn’t turn away, because she was frozen: she watched as the fox’s fur shimmered and shone and vanished, leaving open patches of muscle and skeleton and flesh to the frozen air.

It turned back to look at her, look behind her. It only had half a face. The rest was gaping, swirling, _nothing._  

Angela couldn’t even scream.

“What a lovely surprise,” said a soft voice behind her. Soft as velvet. Soft as smoke. Cold even through the collar of her cloak. “I hope my pets didn't frighten you. They are amenable escorts but unpractised you see, people don’t just accidentally happen upon this place.”

Pets? They weren’t pets, they were--

The voice had a face. It had a body. Though barely. Angela watched as the woman, the witch, the _demon_ circled her and stood between her and the gate. Angela had never seen a person so tall; she had to stand at more than seven feet, and she kept her hands behind her but that didn’t mean Angela couldn’t see the purple fire dancing in her palm and licking against her black, talon-like fingers. She had a smile, though it wasn’t warm. Her eyes were blue and red in turn, and trained to Angela.

“You’re frozen, love, you look like ice. Do come in.” 

 _I don’t know if that’s a good idea,_ Angela wanted to decide. _Actually I should just leave,_ she begged herself to say. But she couldn’t. Supernatural power or just her anxiety tightening itself in her throat, she couldn’t. She could only watch as the witch guided her to the gate and opened it, though she didn’t use her hands, and Angela’s boots could only take her in one direction and that was forward, and she would have slipped on the flat stones in the garden path were it not for the hand on the small of her back.

The fingers spanned the space between her hips entirely, and Angela shuddered.

The door opened of its own and inside the fox lay by the fire, and its brother quickly joined it. Angela could see them better now; half bodied things making one whole creature. Angela swallowed, and forced herself to look elsewhere; the ancient bookcases made from logs, the plush chair by the hearth, the bed with black sheets and a golden frame, impossibly long. She glanced over at her host, who drifted into a small kitchen off from the main room in the house. Then back at the door.

“Here, let me fix you tea. That’ll warm you right up, sweet.” the witch said, and she was in the other room but it felt like she whispered directly into Angela’s mind. In her pocket the gem was heavy. “You look like you’ve been lost for days.”

Had she? Time stretched on endlessly, and lately the weeks had all bled into one another. That wasn’t because of the sunless forest, though. The reason why was the reason she’d come here in the first place.

“You’re all wet from the frost,” the witch was saying, steering her to the fire. “Let me take your cloak.”

Angela swallowed, and finally, _finally_ found her voice. “I’m fine, thank you.”

“If you insist,” the witch sang, and she ducked her head, her hair as red as the fire’s embers and slicked back off of her face. “Please, sit, rest your legs. Tea won’t be far.”

And she drifted off again, and Angela watched as her dress dragged against the stone floor. Was it a dress? It was as though her body was made up of layers upon layers of black silks and feathers and furs, tipping her shoulders and chasing down to thin wrists and spreading to her broad hands, clinging too tightly to be a garment warn. Moving too fluidly to be a garment warn. Angela looked away. Didn’t know where it was better to cast her gaze. 

So she sat in the great chair that was made for a body much bigger than hers. 

She watched the foxes twined together on a rug in front of the fire. She kept her cloak tight round her, and brushed her skirt. 

“You look like moonlight and like summer, all at once,” the witch said quietly when she returned, and she looked at Angela fondly, as though she were an animal. “It’s been so long since we’ve had either.”

She set the silver tray on a small table by Angela’s shin. Only one cup sat with one pot, and Angela supposed that tea was still _tea_ and poured out for herself.

The witch watched her with bright eyes, and sighed when Angela tentatively brought the cup to her lips and sipped.

“Are you a merchant? A traveller?” she asked, and Angela found it slightly awkward that she didn’t find a place to sit, she simply stood, stooping a little at her great height.

Angela cleared her throat. She placed the cup back to the tray; noticed the scorch marks in the table, but couldn’t recognise this ward, either. It was different to Ana’s, even Fareeha’s. “I’m neither. I’m from far away. I’ve been sent here, to seek you out.”

“Oh,” piped the witch, “from the north mountains? You look it. Hair of gold, eyes like the lakes. You must be.”

 “Originally. I live in the south, now, actually.”

“Such a far way to come,” the witch mused. “Drink, warm yourself.” 

Her heart was still beating and her breaths were still filling her lungs, so Angela shrugged one shoulder and leant forward to take her cup.

“Who sent you?”

“I’m not sure you’d remember,” Angela admitted. “But they knew you, long ago. Told me where to find you.”

“I never forget a guest,” the witch told her, tone severe. “Who?”

So Angela licked her lips. Swallowed. Dragged her eyes from the foxes by the fire. “Her name is Ana.” 

Realisation struck and the witch’s eyes went sad, her mouth a line, her shoulders dropping. “Why did she send you, pet?”

She asked as though she already knew, and Angela thumbed the cup of tea, rather than drinking it. “She needs your help. She called you Moira.”

The witch laughed, incredulous. “No one has called me by that name in a very long time. Do you share her Eyes, pet? Did you see the forest? I can’t help her anymore. I can only do one thing.”

She raised her right hand to her eye level and her skin glowed purple. A shadow cut her face in two, but didn’t lessen her gaze, and so Angela looked away and found herself staring at a little purple gem at the centre of her palm, diamond in shape, hovering. The fire in her hand rippled and danced through her fingers. And when Angela glanced back to the foxes, they were cowering, their snouts pressed down into the rug.

The witch outstretched her left. Her fingers curled around an invisible orb, a gem that wasn't there, and she waited.

Nothing.

“Ana stole something from me, long ago, and now I’m out of balance. I’m slipping off the line of this realm, rather than walking it steady."

“So is Ana,” Angela said, a little desperate, a little risky. 

The witch steeled her face. When she looked at Angela the kindness was still there but it was behind a look that was knowing. “She always told me she never feared death. She was a liar.”

“No one knows what happens, in the end. Fearing that isn’t completely without validation.”

For her tongue Angela received a dismissive laugh, brittle and empty, and Angela felt like a child. “Humans don’t know what happens. Alchemists and apocatheries and surgeons mightn’t know. But I do.”

She played with the purple fire in her hand and Angela hated to admit it to herself but she was mesmerised. Watching it was like watching Ana make fireworks with her concoctions, except different, because this time it wasn’t the laws of nature or chemistry at work. This was something different, scienceless. Godless.

Angela swallowed. The twin gem weighed heavy in the pocket of her cloak; but she didn’t think on it. Not yet. Ana said to bargain with it as a last resort. Angela didn't know what it was, but she knew there was a reason Moira didn't have it. “Will you help her?”

“I imagine Ana Amari is hoping my feelings for her will win her this fight. She isn’t wrong. Humans are like insects: when they die, you can’t help but feel a pathetic sort of fondness for them, even if you’re the boot.”

Angela settled her tea down. She stood and dusted down her skirt, still covered in leaves and grass and mud. Her cloak fell around her and she fastened it at her throat, her hands suddenly itchy and searching for anything to do.

“Tell me, pet, are you hers?” Moira asked suddenly, head cocked and eyes keen. Angela made a strange noise that she prayed the witch didn’t catch, and she wrung her hands together.

“Not in that way,” she admitted to Moira, and to herself.

“But you want to be?” She felt so small, and when Moira stood at her full height and smiled Angela felt like she’d already been eaten and hadn’t realised. 

“I-- I’m her prodigee. I’m training in alchemy,” Angela spluttered, in lieu of an answer.

“I understand.” Moira was smiling at her as though she were a puzzle she couldn’t solve. “Believe me, I understand. Perhaps _she_ is of the fae, and our roles are reversed. I can’t sense she uses a spell, but there is something about her, isn’t there?

“Enough for you to come to me and ask me to save her, in the dead of night, so very far from your home,” Moira continued, and she flicked her hand up, and the tray floated off into the kitchen. She stepped closer. “You must have been frightened. What anchored you?”

Angela couldn’t help herself. She shut her eyes. She brushed her palms over her sides, her cloak. Ignored the lump. “Ana did.”

Moira knew she wasn’t telling the truth but she didn’t prod. Angela supposed she didn’t need to. She felt as Moira’s gaze scrutinised every part of her, even down to her soul, and when she came out unscathed she loosed a shaky breath. When she opened her eyes she was faced with Moira’s ribs, and she could see that they were feathers what covered her body, like a bird. Like a crow. “I’ll help her. But I need something in return. Is that not one of your little rules?”

“But I have nothing to offer you,” Angela lied again.

“I missed the summer,” Moira went on to say. “I miss the sun. I’d never thought it possible. But even the gloomy moors where I used to dwell suffered morning’s touch. This forest is black.

“But your hair,” she said, and her fingers, longer than knives, came to Angela’s cheek, and she pulled the tie from the back of her skull so deftly Angela hardly noticed. She hardly noticed her breath. She hardly noticed how heavy her heart was thudding. “Your hair is gold.”

Angela didn’t speak, couldn’t speak. Her hair fell in curls and ringlets around her collared throat, down to her breasts, trapping the fire’s light, and Moira’s talons separated them tress by tress. “I think I understand why a woman like Ana would want to fight death, one last time. If she had a girl like you in her bed.”

“It isn’t like that.”

“Because you’re not that kind of girl?”

“Because Ana doesn’t love me that way.”

“What a shame,” whispered Moira, her accent so strange, her face so sharp and her eyes so, so hungry. “Ana is a fool to let you slip away. If you were mine I'd never see you leave.”

For all her thundering heartbeats and shaking breaths Angela didn’t feel scared. She didn’t feel threatened. There was a hand on the small of her back, and she didn’t mind. And then there was another, slick with purple flames and holding a lonely gemstone, pulling her hair back off her face, and she liked it. 

“What would you like me to give you, Moira?” Angela whispered, eyes downcast, and when she touched Moira’s waist her feathers were surprisingly soft, and her body was warm. 

“What do you believe is a fair trade for Ana Amari’s life?”

* * *

 

**Author's Note:**

> And then they got it on.


End file.
